Speed is the name of game for building prefab home

Take, for example, the basic components of the Smulls' house in Annapolis, Md. -- six modules atop four flatbed trailers -- which arrived at the couple's site early one rainy morning in late July.

By nightfall, walls and a temporary roof were in place atop a previously laid foundation.

Andy and Michael Smull -- she is a photographer, and he is a health care consultant -- expect to move into their three-story, custom-designed 2,800-square-foot modernist prefab home on two-thirds of an acre in late October.

That's almost instant by modern home-building standards, according to contractor John Del Sesto, president of J.A.C. Enterprises of Arnold, Md., who says a "stick built" house of the same dimensions -- trade talk for a building constructed entirely on site -- would take at least a year.

In conjunction with the New York firm of Resolution 4 Architecture, responsible for the original design, Del Sesto is overseeing the extensive interior and exterior features Andy Smull has ordered for what she calls her "dream house."

Her choice of Resolution 4 was inspired by the firm's winning entry in a competition sponsored by San Francisco-based Dwell magazine for an affordable modern prefab.

The Smulls' house is a variation on the so-called Dwell Home, which drew more than 2,000 visitors in a single day when it went on view in Pittsboro, N.C., last month.

The Dwell Home is a far cry from the more modestly priced, modestly sized mail-order "kit" homes sold by Sears in the early decades of the 20th Century.

The Sears catalog homes sold for $9,000 to $80,000 in current dollars. The Dwell Home had an original budget of $175,000, or $125 a square foot, which Joe Tanney of Resolution 4 estimates to be a savings of half or more in cost over a conventional home of a similar size.

This estimate excludes what he refers to as "typical site costs."

Prefab, for prefabricated, is anything factory-made and can include mobile homes, although these most often are referred to as manufactured housing.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has said that modular home structures, made to withstand the stress of travel and lifting by crane, are stronger than site-built housing.

Prefab panel or modular housing styles associated with a predictable cookie-cutter design still are being turned out by factories that offer limited design options and seldom involve architects.

Because of its association with mobile homes in most people's minds, prefab has had a negative connotation, says Fred Hallahan, a Baltimore-based housing consultant who focuses on factory-built housing.

He reports a modest increase in modular styles--40,000 homes nationally were put up last year, a 2 percent increase over the previous year.

"Ninety-five percent of American homes being built don't involve architects," Tanney says.

He said his company thought about "how to supply a relatively affordable model for the housing market."

Stockbroker Bryon Fusini was going to renovate a farmhouse on 4 1/2 acres he owns in The Plains, Va., when he realized the huge expenses that could be involved in bringing a 1909 house up to code.

Intrigued by the flexibility and aesthetic of modular design, he contacted Resolution 4, which agreed to oversee the razing and construction process along with a local contractor.

Fusini's prime consideration, he says, was having "something sensitive to the site ... a structure that would have lots of glass and help us enjoy the outdoors."

"Industry building is pretty standardized stuff," notes Allison Arieff, Dwell magazine's editor in chief, who says positive reaction to the magazine's competition "illustrates the housing industry is not serving [the] segment of the public [interested in modern architecture].

"The majority of the population probably do not want to have modern architecture, but there are enough people to make it worthwhile."

Changing tastes as well as changing technologies are responsible for much of the innovation. Arieff points to "more design-savvy consumers" in today's marketplace, such as those attracted to Target store products designed by architects such as Michael Graves.

"This is a computer-built house," Andy Smull says knowingly of the architect's use of CAD, or computer-assisted design, which is then handed over to a structural engineer.

"The technology is in the factory."

Her own aesthetics will figure greatly in her home's final look, but, even so, Del Sesto estimates the choice of prefab components saves 20 percent of the final cost and four to six months' building time.

The main hitch is finding manufacturers willing and able to work with architects in supplying the parts that make up custom modular designs.

Penn Lyon Homes Corp. of Selinsgrove, Pa., shipped the Smull modules according to the architect's specifications.

Excel Homes of Liverpool, Pa., works with Falls Church architect Thomas Hemphill to supply modules for second-story additions on typical rambler-style houses for owners who find skyrocketing land costs make a move to a bigger house prohibitive.